Sara O'Neal
Board Member
Between being a practitioner and a consultant, Sara has over 35 years of experience in development, capital campaigns, feasibility studies, organizational development and strategic planning,
She has served as Senior Vice President for Brakeley Briscoe, a national fundraising and management consulting company, President of the Nonprofit Consulting Team, and President of Green Pursuits. Sara has held staff positions as Director of Development at the Atlanta Ballet and the Regional Director of Major Gifts – East for Sierra Club’s Centennial Campaign. In this successful capital Centennial Campaign, she was honored in the Sierra Club BOD minutes as having done “a magnificent job not only in raising funds but also in developing a pool of prospects and in working closely with Club volunteers…”
Because of her extensive training and capacity building consulting work, in 2000 Sara was selected as one of four trainers to be interviewed nationally for a best practices study funded by the David and Lucile Packard Foundation with the results published as Echoes from the Field: Proven Capacity-Building Principles for Nonprofits.
She has taught various fundraising and organizational development classes for Duke University’s Continuing Education Nonprofit Management Program.
Sara started her professional fundraising career at Capital Consortium in Raleigh, NC where she contributed to the premier issue of the North Carolina Grantseeking Directory.
In 2012, she conducted a study was for The Overbrook Foundation, NY on the Needs, Characteristics and Best Practices of Environmental Networks and Coalitions (surveyed groups all over the U.S).
Having lived in GA for some thirty-five years, Sara has worked with a variety of GA clients including: YWCA of Greater Atlanta (general fundraising and planning to position them for a capital campaign), Jerusalem House (organizational planning and fundraising campaign), The ROCK (fundraising planning for fundraising campaign), Allied Arts (strategic planning), Cherokee County Historical Society (assisted with preparation of successful National Trust for Historical Preservation grant and fundraising campaign planning and research), Georgia Center for Children (ongoing fundraising campaign support), Georgia Center for Pastoral Care (fundraising campaign planning), the Governor’s Environmental Quality Council (committee structure planning and facilitation), Nexus Contemporary Art Center (fundraising campaign planning), and Product Policy Institute (ongoing fundraising and organizational development counsel).